Louisiana State Employees Retirement System Sells 1,700 Shares of Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN)

Louisiana State Employees Retirement System trimmed its stake in Accenture plc (NYSE:ACN) by 4.8% during the fourth quarter, according to its most recent disclosure with the Securities and Exchange Commission (SEC). The firm owned 33,600 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock after selling 1,700 shares during the period. Louisiana State Employees Retirement System’s holdings in Accenture were worth $11,820,000 as of its most recent SEC filing.

Other institutional investors and hedge funds also recently made changes to their positions in the company. CX Institutional boosted its stake in Accenture by 432.8% in the third quarter. CX Institutional now owns 18,840 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $6,660,000 after purchasing an additional 15,304 shares in the last quarter. Creative Planning increased its position in Accenture by 5.5% in the 3rd quarter. Creative Planning now owns 247,724 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $87,566,000 after acquiring an additional 12,993 shares in the last quarter. NBC Securities Inc. raised its stake in shares of Accenture by 0.6% in the third quarter. NBC Securities Inc. now owns 5,206 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock worth $1,840,000 after acquiring an additional 30 shares during the last quarter. Birch Capital Management LLC grew its stake in shares of Accenture by 5.2% during the third quarter. Birch Capital Management LLC now owns 18,226 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $6,443,000 after purchasing an additional 900 shares during the last quarter. Finally, Swedbank AB increased its holdings in shares of Accenture by 16.6% in the third quarter. Swedbank AB now owns 2,551,679 shares of the information technology services provider’s stock valued at $901,967,000 after purchasing an additional 363,401 shares in the last quarter. Institutional investors and hedge funds own 75.14% of the company’s stock.

Analysts Set New Price Targets

A number of brokerages have commented on ACN. BMO Capital Markets increased their price objective on Accenture from $390.00 to $425.00 and gave the company a “market perform” rating in a research report on Friday, December 20th. Jefferies Financial Group cut their target price on shares of Accenture from $385.00 to $355.00 and set a “hold” rating on the stock in a research report on Tuesday, January 21st. Morgan Stanley lifted their price target on shares of Accenture from $335.00 to $380.00 and gave the stock an “equal weight” rating in a research report on Friday, January 31st. BNP Paribas lowered shares of Accenture from an “outperform” rating to a “neutral” rating and set a $375.00 target price for the company. in a report on Wednesday, October 30th. Finally, Piper Sandler lifted their price objective on Accenture from $422.00 to $429.00 and gave the stock an “overweight” rating in a research note on Thursday, December 19th. Eight equities research analysts have rated the stock with a hold rating and sixteen have assigned a buy rating to the company. According to data from MarketBeat.com, the stock presently has a consensus rating of “Moderate Buy” and an average target price of $387.22.

Insider Activity at Accenture

In related news, CFO Angie Y. Park sold 685 shares of the stock in a transaction on Friday, January 17th. The stock was sold at an average price of $354.38, for a total value of $242,750.30. Following the transaction, the chief financial officer now directly owns 8,674 shares in the company, valued at $3,073,892.12. This trade represents a 7.32 % decrease in their position. The sale was disclosed in a document filed with the Securities & Exchange Commission, which is available at this link. Also, insider Angela Beatty sold 375 shares of the business’s stock in a transaction on Monday, December 23rd. The shares were sold at an average price of $358.50, for a total transaction of $134,437.50. Following the sale, the insider now owns 5,149 shares of the company’s stock, valued at $1,845,916.50. This trade represents a 6.79 % decrease in their position. The disclosure for this sale can be found here. Insiders have sold 22,280 shares of company stock worth $8,316,190 over the last ninety days. Insiders own 0.02% of the company’s stock.

Accenture Stock Up 0.9 %

Shares of NYSE ACN opened at $390.21 on Wednesday. Accenture plc has a 1 year low of $278.69 and a 1 year high of $398.35. The company has a debt-to-equity ratio of 0.17, a current ratio of 1.47 and a quick ratio of 1.47. The firm has a market cap of $244.19 billion, a PE ratio of 32.74, a price-to-earnings-growth ratio of 3.44 and a beta of 1.24. The company has a 50 day simple moving average of $362.81 and a 200 day simple moving average of $352.74.

Accenture (NYSE:ACN) last issued its quarterly earnings data on Thursday, December 19th. The information technology services provider reported $3.59 earnings per share for the quarter, topping the consensus estimate of $3.43 by $0.16. The company had revenue of $17.69 billion for the quarter, compared to analysts’ expectations of $17.15 billion. Accenture had a net margin of 11.41% and a return on equity of 26.91%. Accenture’s revenue for the quarter was up 9.0% on a year-over-year basis. During the same quarter in the previous year, the firm posted $3.27 earnings per share. On average, research analysts forecast that Accenture plc will post 12.73 EPS for the current year.

Accenture Dividend Announcement

The business also recently disclosed a quarterly dividend, which will be paid on Friday, February 14th. Investors of record on Thursday, January 16th will be paid a $1.48 dividend. This represents a $5.92 dividend on an annualized basis and a dividend yield of 1.52%. The ex-dividend date is Thursday, January 16th. Accenture’s dividend payout ratio is currently 49.66%.

About Accenture

Accenture plc, a professional services company, provides strategy and consulting, industry X, song, and technology and operation services worldwide. The company offers application services, including agile transformation, DevOps, application modernization, enterprise architecture, software and quality engineering, data management; intelligent automation comprising robotic process automation, natural language processing, and virtual agents; and application management services, as well as software engineering services; strategy and consulting services; data and analytics strategy, data discovery and augmentation, data management and beyond, data democratization, and industrialized solutions comprising turnkey analytics and artificial intelligence (AI) solutions; metaverse; and sustainability services.